A cemetery full of the restless dead. A town so wicked it has already burned twice, with the breath of the third fire looming. A rural, isolated bridge with a terrifying monster waiting for the completion of its summoning ritual. A lake that allows the drowned to return, though they have been changed by the claws of death. These are the shadowed, liminal spaces where the curses and monsters lurk, refusing to be forgotten.
Hauntings, and a variety of horrifying secrets, lurk in the places we once called home. Written by New York Times bestselling, and other critically acclaimed, authors these stories shed a harsh light on the scariest tales we grew up with.
Ok, this was partly my fault. I misread the sumamry and thought this was retellings of urban legends. It's not; they're new stories based in the same kind of horror that colors urban legends. On the plus side, I'm possibly still as well up on my urban legends as I thought I was; I was getting really worried when I didn't recognise any of these!
Short story collections are very variable, not only between collections but within them, between the stories, as well. I really enjoyed a couple of the stories here, had a few that were dubious, one or two that were too complicated and not really suited to short story format, and a couple that could easily have become full novels. None of them really scared me as they all seemed very specific to place and circumstance, but they were quite creepy and I can see how people would be scared by them.
Not terrifying, but a good interesting read and a great introduction to some authors I wasn't too familiar with before.
The Gathering Dark publishes on the 6th September, 2022. I received a free copy and am giving an honest review.
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